A 41-year-old Denver man who posed as a MoneyGram employee has been sentenced to prison for bilking the company out of nearly $625,000 during a four year period.
The Secret Service said that Patrick Hamilton, claiming he was a MoneyGram employee, told MoneyGram’s merchant vendors that he needed to “test” their system.
He would then arrange for certain MoneyGram locations to send “test” wire transfers from $5,000 to $9,000 to other vendors, according to investigators.
Each time a transfer was made, Hamilton would be given a wire transaction number.
He would then give the number to accomplices, who would go to the vendor, present an identification card, including the sender’s name, and pick up the money.
Hamilton would later meet his accomplices, pay them as much as $1,200 and keep the rest of the money for himself.
In total, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Denver, Hamilton completed more than 200 fraudulent transactions totaling about $625,000.
Chief U.S. District Court Judge Wiley Daniel sentenced Hamilton to 33 months in federal prison and ordered him to pay restitution of $624,779 to MoneyGram.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com
